Court Filings

The Georgia Court of Appeals considered an application for an interlocutory appeal filed in case A26I0187 (LC No. 25C11603), captioned Matthew Baratian v. Theresa Strickland. The court reviewed the application and denied it on May 6, 2026. No further explanation or reasoning is included in the order; it is a short ministerial entry certifying the denial and the clerk's certification of the minutes.

The Court of Appeals of Georgia affirmed a trial court judgment for the Vinings Estates Homeowners Association (HOA) against Earl and Deidre Cotton. The HOA sued over the Cottons’ unapproved construction of an outdoor kitchen and pool pavilion that violated the subdivision’s Declaration and board-adopted design guidelines. A jury awarded the HOA monetary relief for fines and attorney fees, and the trial court later granted a permanent injunction requiring removal of the detached structure. The court held the Declaration plainly allowed the HOA to adopt enforceable design guidelines, rejected the Cottons’ procedural and evidentiary challenges, and found no abuse of discretion in issuing the injunction.

The Georgia Court of Appeals granted Shakka Shaneak James's application for discretionary appeal from a superior court order that denied her request to file a pro se mandamus petition under OCGA § 9-15-2(d). The Court concluded the superior court’s denial is subject to direct appeal under state appellate statutes, so James may proceed by filing a notice of appeal. The Court directed the superior court clerk to include this order in the record and gave James ten days from this order to file a notice of appeal if she has not already done so.

The Court of Appeals dismissed an appeal by Chakina Patton from a Clayton County Probate Court order in her petition to be declared sole heir of her deceased father. The probate court had found Chakina to be an heir but expressly left several matters unresolved — including a competing paternity claim by Aneki Floyd, a motion for disbursement, and a potential permanent administration petition — and entered a judgment against Chakina for dissipating estate property. Because the probate court's order was not final, Chakina needed to pursue interlocutory appeal procedures (including a certificate of immediate review) and failed to do so, depriving this Court of jurisdiction.

The Court of Appeals dismissed Jennifer Daugherty’s direct appeal of a trial court contempt order against Matthew Woodard for failure to follow the required discretionary-appeal procedure for domestic relations matters. The appellate court explained that orders holding or declining to hold someone in contempt in a domestic relations case must be reviewed by application for discretionary appeal under OCGA § 5-6-35, and that compliance with that procedure is jurisdictional. Because Daugherty filed a direct appeal instead of an application for discretionary appeal, the Court of Appeals concluded it lacked jurisdiction and dismissed the appeal.

The Court of Appeals reviewed Jackie Pratcher’s pro se suit against the Georgia Department of Human Services, Division of Child Support Services, and the Georgia Department of Driver Services seeking damages, declaratory relief, and injunctive relief after his driver’s license was suspended. The trial court dismissed all claims as barred by sovereign immunity and for failure to attach ante litem notices. The appeals court affirmed dismissal of the damages claim, reversed and vacated the dismissal of the declaratory and injunctive claims because Pratcher timely cured the ante litem defect and the trial court failed to analyze the constitutional waiver of sovereign immunity, and remanded for the trial court to decide whether the waiver applies.

The Court of Appeals transferred Draper Lucas’s appeal to the Supreme Court of Georgia. Lucas was convicted of multiple sexual offenses and challenged, in a motion for new trial, the clarity and constitutionality of a special probation condition under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The trial court implicitly rejected that constitutional challenge by including the condition in the corrected final disposition order. Because a constitutional question was raised and ruled on below, the Court of Appeals concluded that jurisdiction may lie with the Supreme Court and therefore transferred the case for disposition.

The Georgia Court of Appeals considered an application for discretionary appeal filed in case A26D0457, Karon Courtney v. Moody Law P.C. et al., arising from litigation under LC No. 24CV002138. The court reviewed the application and denied the request for discretionary review on May 5, 2026. No further reasoning, findings, or modification of the underlying judgment are provided in the order; the document only records the procedural disposition denying the application for discretionary appeal.

The Court of Appeals dismissed David Ingle’s application for interlocutory review of the trial court’s February 26, 2026 order because the trial court’s certificate of immediate review was issued 41 days after entry of the underlying order, far beyond the ten-day statutory deadline. The court explained that the ten-day period begins on the entry of the order (when it is filed with the clerk), not on later service, so delayed service does not extend the deadline. The court noted the trial court could vacate and reinstate the order and certificate to allow another interlocutory appeal opportunity.

The Georgia Supreme Court vacated a Henry County trial court order that had declared Anthony Faison immune from prosecution for his role in the April 16, 2025 shooting death of Curtis Johnson. The State had indicted Faison on multiple counts, including felony murder and burglary. The Supreme Court concluded the trial court applied the wrong legal analysis in granting immunity under OCGA § 16-3-20 because it focused on whether the county sheriff could revoke Faison’s bail-recovery-agent status rather than applying the specific statutory bases and elements required to find justification. The case is remanded for further proceedings.

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Ja’Mychael Peavy’s convictions for felony murder, aggravated assault (which merged into felony murder), and one count of firearm possession arising from a workplace shooting. Peavy challenged the verdict form and related jury instructions as improperly sequential, the exclusion of proffered expert testimony bearing on his self-defense theory, and that the guilty verdicts were repugnant given a not-guilty firearm possession verdict on a separate count. The Court found no sequential-instruction error, held the expert testimony was properly excluded under Georgia evidentiary rules and did not implicate constitutional error, and found no record evidence of a truly repugnant verdict, so it affirmed the judgment.

The Georgia Supreme Court found that an assistant district attorney (ADA Deborah Leslie) used artificial intelligence to draft briefs and a proposed trial-court order without verifying case citations, resulting in multiple fictitious or misattributed authorities being filed. The Court admonished the Clayton County District Attorney’s Office, suspended ADA Leslie’s privilege to practice before the Court for six months with continuing-education conditions, vacated the trial court’s order denying Hannah Payne’s motion for a new trial, and remanded with instructions that the trial court issue a new order prepared by the court (not by counsel) and free of fake or misattributed citations.

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Tyler Merritt’s convictions for malice murder and related offenses arising from the January 26, 2020 shooting death of Wayne Cunningham. Merritt argued the trial court erred by instructing the jury on conspiracy, but the Court held the evidence — surveillance showing Merritt and others arriving together, moving into the victim’s room, the victim being shot, the group fleeing together in a stolen car, phone contacts and location data tying Merritt to a co-participant, and recovery of the murder weapon and victim’s property in a room Merritt rented — provided sufficient support for a conspiracy instruction. Because the evidence permitted an inference of a mutual criminal plan, the instruction was proper and the convictions were affirmed.

The Supreme Court of Georgia denied a petition for certiorari in Amy Wade Johnson v. City of Vidalia, leaving in place the Court of Appeals' reversal of the trial court’s denial of summary judgment for the City. Justice Pinson concurred, agreeing denial was proper because the Court of Appeals also held Johnson failed to show disputed facts about the City’s notice of the sidewalk defect — an independently sufficient ground. Justice Pinson cautioned that the Court of Appeals erred in suggesting municipalities cannot be liable for passive failures to maintain sidewalks and noted that existing Georgia precedent establishes municipal duty to keep sidewalks safe when the city had actual or constructive notice of defects.

The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed Kenneth Jackson’s convictions for malice murder, multiple aggravated assaults, and violations of the gang statute arising from a May 10, 2014 shooting that killed a nine‑month‑old and wounded others. Jackson challenged sufficiency of the evidence, the denial of a directed verdict, alleged trial counsel ineffectiveness, admission of gang‑related evidence, and a judge’s comment and denial of a mistrial. The Court found the evidence sufficient, counsel’s performance reasonable, no plain error in admitting cumulative gang evidence, and the mistrial claim unpreserved, and therefore affirmed the trial court’s judgment.

The Supreme Court of Georgia accepted Shaquandra A. Woods’s petition for voluntary surrender of her law license after she admitted a felony conviction for conspiracy to commit wire fraud in federal court and acknowledged violating Rule 8.4(a)(2) of the Georgia Rules of Professional Conduct. The court treated the voluntary surrender as equivalent to disbarment, referencing recent precedents where felony convictions led to the same sanction. The Court ordered that Woods’s name be removed from the rolls of persons authorized to practice law in Georgia and reminded her of her duties under Bar Rule 4-219(b).

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Eric Bernard Hills’s convictions for malice murder and related offenses arising from the November 11, 2020 shooting death of Branden Lewis. Hills argued the trial court erred by refusing to instruct the jury on voluntary manslaughter, but the Court held the omission was not plain error because the evidence did not show Hills acted from sudden passion provoked sufficiently to make a reasonable person lose self-control. Rather, the record showed Hills brought a firearm to the residence, shot Lewis multiple times, and told police he fired because Lewis “raised his hand,” supporting a self-defense/fear narrative rather than provocation sufficient for manslaughter.

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Stephan Blake Dickey’s convictions for malice murder and related offenses. The court reviewed and rejected Dickey’s challenge to the denial of his motion to suppress his custodial statement, concluding that the trial court properly applied a totality-of-the-circumstances test and reasonably found that Dickey, a juvenile, knowingly and voluntarily waived his Miranda rights. The court also held the trial court’s written and on-the-record findings were sufficient for appellate review and found that brief postponement of a restroom request and absence of a parent did not render the waiver involuntary.

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed most of Johnnie Bryant’s convictions arising from the November 1, 2021 shooting that killed Dylan Eldridge and injured others. The Court held the evidence was sufficient to support convictions for malice murder, two aggravated assaults, and three firearm-possession counts, rejected claims of trial error and ineffective assistance of counsel, and found no reversible prosecutorial misconduct. However, the Court vacated Bryant’s aggravated-assault conviction against the deceased victim because that offense merged with the malice murder conviction for sentencing, and corrected a sentencing nomenclature regarding the felony-murder count.

The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed the convictions of Everett Bennett and Travis Kates for malice murder and related firearms offenses in the 2019 shooting death of Antonio Randolph. The court held that the trial court properly admitted evidence tying Kates to distinctive ammunition found in a prior shots-fired incident as intrinsic and not unduly prejudicial, and that Bennett failed to show ineffective assistance of counsel or resulting prejudice from several trial decisions. The Court also denied a remand to correct purported scrivener’s errors on Kates’s sentencing sheet because the operative indictment’s numbering matched the sentencing documents.

The Court of Appeals dismissed Vincent A. West’s appeal for lack of jurisdiction. West pleaded guilty in 2019 and sought leave to file an out-of-time appeal; the trial court denied that request on January 23, 2026. West filed a notice of appeal on February 25, 2026, which was 33 days after the trial court’s order. Because Georgia law requires a notice of appeal within 30 days, the appellate court concluded it had no jurisdiction and dismissed the appeal.

The Georgia Court of Appeals dismissed Maurice Dewayne Conner’s appeal from the trial court’s denial of his amended motion for a new trial because the notice of appeal was untimely. Conner was convicted and sentenced in 2014, but did not file a motion for new trial within the 30-day statutory window; his motion filed in March 2025 was over ten years late. Because an untimely motion for new trial does not extend the deadline to file a notice of appeal, the Court concluded it lacked jurisdiction and dismissed the appeal.

The Georgia Court of Appeals granted the appellant's unopposed motion to withdraw the appeal in the case Leslie Girardeau Lee v. William Chandler Lee et al. By allowing withdrawal, the court released jurisdiction back to the trial court effective upon receipt of the order. The order is ministerial and contains no opinion on the merits; it simply acknowledges the appellant's request and returns the matter to the lower court for further proceedings consistent with that withdrawal.

The Georgia Court of Appeals considered an application for an interlocutory appeal filed in case A26I0189 (LC No. 24SV094) and denied the application on May 4, 2026. The order is brief and procedural: the court declined to allow an immediate appeal from an interlocutory order, leaving the underlying trial-court proceedings to continue in the trial court. No substantive discussion of the merits or legal reasoning is included in the order.

The Court of Appeals considered a direct appeal by Carlos Hernandez from the White County Probate Court dismissing his claim against the Estate of Mary Catherine Bonner and denying his petition alleging administrator misconduct. The court held that because White County's population (28,003 in 2020) is below the statutory 90,000 threshold, the statutory right of direct appeal from a probate court to an appellate court does not apply. The filing is treated as a civil case filed in the wrong forum and is remanded to the probate court with directions to transmit the matter to the White County Superior Court for further proceedings.

The Georgia Court of Appeals dismissed Phillip Hugh Wright's appeal for failure to comply with court rules requiring filing an enumeration of errors and an appellate brief. The appellant did not respond to the Court's notice of docketing or its specific order to file those documents by April 24, 2026. Because the required materials remain unfiled, the court deemed the appeal abandoned and entered an order of dismissal under its procedural rules.

The Georgia Court of Appeals denied an emergency motion by The Georgia Virtue seeking expedited consideration and an immediate reversal of a trial court order before May 7, 2026. The court’s order is procedural and short: it simply refuses the request for accelerated review and does not address the merits of the underlying appeal or the trial court’s judgment. No opinion or reasoning on the substantive issues was issued, and the usual appellate schedule and procedures remain in place.

The Georgia Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of Chatham County from a wrongful death and personal injury lawsuit arising from a 2016 high-speed police pursuit. Plaintiffs argued the County waived sovereign immunity under OCGA § 36-92-2 because County and City police operated jointly, but the trial court found, based on evidence, that the vehicles involved were owned by the City and not the County. Because the statutory waiver applies only to vehicles owned, leased, or rented by the local government at issue, the County had not waived immunity and dismissal was proper.

The Georgia Court of Appeals dismissed Ergin Tek's appeal from Holly Park Square Apartments, LLC because the appellant failed to comply with the court's docketing notice and Court of Appeals Rule 23(a) by not filing an enumeration of errors and brief within the required time. The court had ordered those filings by May 1, 2026; they were not filed by the May 4, 2026 order date. Citing Court of Appeals Rules 7 and 23(a) (and Rule 13), the court deemed the appeal abandoned and ordered dismissal.

The Georgia Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of Devine Roberts’s “breach of trust” equity suit because the petition sought relief that would improperly interfere with a pending county code enforcement prosecution over his dogs. The appellate court held that the trial court correctly evaluated the sufficiency of the pleadings under the motion-to-dismiss standard, found Roberts’s equitable claims barred because an adequate remedy existed in the underlying code enforcement proceedings, and upheld a restriction on Roberts’s pro se filings as reasonable given repeated frivolous submissions. The court deferred review of any attorney-fee award because none was finally entered.